I have in my possession a most interesting set of papers written by girls in their early twenties regarding their memories of their own training in prayer and the result of it in their lives.  I quote first from the papers of girls brought up in Christian homes.

“I can remember now the very wording of some of my father’s prayers and those words found their way into my own—­some of them are still there.  Often when a child, I prayed impulsively, using unconventional terms and saying ‘you’ instead of ‘thou.’  Before I was twelve mother often reminded me of my prayers when she said good night.  As I grew older nothing was said to me about it.  I was hot-tempered and continually ‘getting mad’ at other girls and teachers and almost every one.  No one will ever know the remorse I suffered after one of those outbursts.  At night I would pour out my soul in a plea for forgiveness.  I was sure God forgave me and started next day with determination to conquer.  I often prayed about examinations which were very hard for me.  Once or twice I prayed that mother would see that I needed a different kind of dress from the one she planned.  I am sure that I felt God was a sympathetic friend and prayer to me was natural.”

Here was a girl who because of the cultivation in the home turned simply and naturally to God to supply her need.  She is today a pure, healthy, natural young woman who has seemingly triumphed over her propensity to “get mad.”  Another girl says: 

“I have prayed ever since I remember.  We always had family prayers at home and in church our pastor always prayed for us children.  I used to pray when I was afraid, which I often was at night when the wind blew, and I felt comforted.  My little sister was not strong and for years I prayed every night that God would let us keep her.  Sometimes when I had been scolded in school for whispering, in which I was a great offender, I prayed in shame and remorse for forgiveness.  As I grew older I still prayed when afraid and repentant and often on a beautiful day, or in the canoe at sunset when I could not say all I felt.  When I was about eighteen I began to pray for the missionaries and people who were poor and sick.  I do not remember any definite instruction about prayer.  It seemed natural to me.  I often felt doubts when the answer didn’t come but had a very definite feeling that the trouble must be with me.”

This girl by environment and unconscious training has also found speaking with God a natural thing.  There are so many papers which express through different personalities the same general facts which cannot fail to impress one who reads, with the power of the cultivation of prayer.

But in the papers and from the interviews of girls in the early twenties whose only definite relation with the church is the Sunday-school class, who come from non-Christian homes, whose parents almost never enter a church a different note sounds.

One says: